Swansea have replaced Alan Curtis with Francesco Guidolin but were they right
to sack Garry Monk in the first place?

The decision made by the Swansea City board to remove Garry Monk at the beginning of December was roundly questioned as the world of football reacted to one of the more baffling managerial changes. With the team 15th in the table they could certainly have improved but their form since he departed has fuelled the feeling that such a change all too hasty and ill-advised.

With no replacement lined up Alan Curtis has taken charge of the last seven games, with Swansea plummeting towards the drop zone while those around them grow in confidence and gain momentum.

Curtis was initially tasked with saving Swansea

Drastic action has been taken as the club parachute in the vastly experienced Francesco Guidolin in the hope of securing Premier League survival – but will it be worth their while having dismissed a manager who knew the club inside out and who many thought was more than capable of keeping them in the top flight?

In the five Premier League seasons prior to the current one, 19 managers at relegation-threatened clubs have been sacked mid-season (between mid-November and early April), with a replacement plunged in at the deep end and charged with turning their fortunes around.

Impact on season's points per game after managerial change

Manager

Difference in points per game

Pulis - Palace

0.88

Hodgson - West Brom

0.63

Pulis - West Brom

0.54

Redknapp - QPR

0.53

Sherwood - Villa

0.35

Monk - Swansea

0.29

O'Neill - Sunderland

0.28

Hughes - QPR

0.26

Magath - Fulham

0.24

Pochettino - Southampton

0.19

Di Canio - Sunderland

0.14

Advocaat - Sunderland

0.02

Meulensteen - Fulham

0

Adkins - Reading

-0.14

Kean - Blackburn

-0.18

Mel - West Brom

-0.22

Solskjaer - Cardiff

-0.23

Connor - Wolves

-0.53

Adams - Norwich

-0.77

Of those, 12 have had a positive impact on their new team’s points per game rate, with the same number going on to secure their Premier League status for another year and seven relegated from the top flight.

Mid-season managerial sacking at relegation-threatened clubs

Fate

Team survived

12

Team relegated

7

Those stats alone seem to suggest that pulling the trigger on one manager and hiring a replacement is more often than not beneficial to those at the wrong end of the table.

However, ‘relegation threated’ is too broad a term for this analysis. Midway through a season, any team in the bottom half can usually be considered in a relegation battle, so let’s look instead at those managerial changes when teams are – like Swansea at present – in the bottom four.

Of the 13 managers who have been brought in after a sacking with their new team 17th or below in the Premier League, seven have failed to avoid relegation.

Solskjaer had a torrid time at Cardiff

Managerial alterations at Fulham (twice), Cardiff, Norwich, Reading, Queens Park Rangers and Wolves have not resulted in sufficient upturn in fortunes to see them survive. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Neil Adams even managed to take Cardiff and Norwich from 17th down into the bottom three between their appointment and the end of the season.

There is hope for Swansea, however, in that all three of the managerial sackings when a team was in the bottom four last season resulted in a significant improvement in results and Premier League survival.

Tony Pulis replaced Alan Irvine at West Brom and took them from 17th to 13th; Dick Advocaat helped Sunderland from 17th to a final position of 16th and Tim Sherwood moved Aston Villa out of the bottom three to safety.

Pulis also took Crystal Palace from 19th to 11th in 2013/14, while Mark Hughes and Roy Hodgson saved QPR and West Brom in 2011 and 2010, respectively. The common theme, however, may be cause for concern for Swansea City fans.

Pulis is the perfect manager to save a club from the drop

For these saviours, Premier League experience has proved vital. Dick Advocaat is the only one for whom this was their first Premier League post, though he had such wide-ranging previous roles that he was at least prepared for the challenges that came with facing something so new.

Sherwood’s short stint at Tottenham will have helped, but so too would captaining a Premier League-winning team and an 18-year playing career in England during which he was involved in relegation battles. Meanwhile the pragmatic Pulis is the master of turning relegation-battles into mid-table comfort.

On the other hand, recent years have seen the likes of Solskjaer, Pepe Mel, Felix Magath, Terry Connor and Steve Kean struggle in their first Premier League post having come in with their new team facing an uphill battle to survive.

Were Swansea right to remove Monk in the first place?

Guidolin, too, is new to this business. He has been a manager for 30 years – on and off – though all but one of those years was spent in his native Italy (the other was at Monaco when they finished 10th having been Champions League runners up two years earlier). How well he can adapt to life in England remains to be seen.

The new Swansea boss faces a tough challenge if he is to save a team who have it all to do in their next 16 games. One point above the drop zone after Monday’s narrow, fraught victory over Watford, Guidolin will need to fare better when it comes to battling relegation than some of the debuting Premier League managers that have preceded him.